Happy Halloween!

It has been a busy week...... like always! Monday the kids played outside while I got to sew a little and came in with two handfuls of wildflowers they had picked. Very sweet kids I have.

Tuesday we carved some pumpkins and then had their last soccer game of the season. The kids did great and have learned so much in the two months since they started.

Yesterday after a morning meeting at work I got to have a special lunch date with my son at his school. They have two tables set aside - one on the stage and one by the windows in the cafeteria. Guess which one we had to sit at? Yup, you guessed it. He took us right up on the stage. Just the two of us with our Wendy's lunch bags (his choice!). Another Mom and her son moved up and joined us after a few minutes. His classmates kept looking and waving and I got to put a few more names to faces and meet a few of them. His question when I was leaving - 'Mom, Can Dad come and do this too.... and then you come every day?'. I am going to enjoy this since I am sure it will not be too long before they want nothing to do with us! As Emmy can not go with me for lunch dates at school (school policy) I will just try and do this once a month and have Grandma pick up Emmy for a special lunch date. A big thanks to my MIL for collecting Em yesterday and taking her for lunch at IHOP - her choice!. My kids are too funny.

Photo at our local farm stand this month.

Today Aidan has  a little party at school and so does Emily. I am a parent helper at her school today so it should be interesting. The kids looked so cute dressed in their costumes at VPK this morning. I can't wait to see all of them around 10AM. I know my tinkerbell loves her costume.... and I'm sure she will be wearing it a lot for dress up.

Kids in costumes 10/25 for the PTO trick or treat at the school.

Tiny Tuesday... Lucky Star

This week I paper pieced Midget Block #108 - Lucky Star. This one was very simple to put together and I love the purple fabrics in this. These are from the free pattern section over at Sentimental Stitches and each block will finish at 4.5 inches.

This weekend I finally finished the binding on this purple pineapple blossom quilt. It was gifted yesterday to Ms. Tammy at VPK. I hope she likes it.

Slow stitching Sunday....

Plans changed. Instead of taking the kids to Sea World (they have not figured it out yet) we will have a relaxing day at home. We might head over to the trail head and take a walk in the woods, maybe a bike ride around the neighborhood and hopefully they will do some playing outside in the back yard and get some energy out. Everyone is still sniffly and I think a day at home with no real plans is the perfect thing. Maybe I can even get them down for naps? A girl can dream. I fear nap time for Emily has come to an end =(. She tends to sleep too long (2-3 hours) and will not wake up to tickling, kisses or talking. Then she is not tired until after 9 at night.

For me ......I have an applique block to prep for hand applique this week. I pulled the first block for the Century quilt and it has bias vines..... so I just had to stop at Joann's after bowling on Thursday and use my 50% off coupon to purchase a clover bias seam maker. It was so easy to do... now to follow the directions and glue everything down onto the fabrics. I'll have my hand work for the car line wait this week all set to go. If this works.... then I can try the  border I really want to add to the birds in the air quilt! Baby steps. This pattern called for the 3/4 inch bias maker. I'm thinking if this works well, maybe I'll have to get a 1.5 inch one to make a nice big vine for a border. Any tips for me on using bias vines? I'm a newbie at this and any and all tips are wonderful.

Head on over to quilter Kathy and see what other slow stitch projects are being worked on today.

Finish up challenge!

 Jo at Jo's Country Junction has issued a challenge to finish a Bonnie quilt up before Thanksgiving. Bonnie's  new mystery starts the day after Thanksgiving... so if we finish one we can start something NEW!!!!! Right?
I'm joining in her link up party on Saturday's to see progress.

My goal is to get this monster of a quilt top quilted and bound in the next month. I have a plan for the quilting using my walking foot and some squiggly lines. I have the backing 104x108. The batting is cut and just needs to be pieced (why oh why didn't I just buy a king size?). Then it will be time to roll it onto the boards for pinning. That means I need to clear off the sewing table so I have space to do that. That is the goal for next week - get it pinned.

Looking back - I have made a few of Bonnie's patterns. These are in no particular order and the patterns can be found at Quiltville.com in the free pattern section.

String X - a boo boo made it very unique. Gifted to Ms. Dawn - Aidan's VPK teacher.

Bricks and stepping stones- clearing out homespuns - gifted to my nephew Charlie 

Pineapple Blossom - binding will be finished this weekend and gifted next week.

Star Struck - scrappy - for Chrystal, the kids sitter at the gym in VT

Star struck - brights - for my niece Mindy as a graduation gift.

Halloween peels in black....

This week was spent doing some applique and I have added a couple more X and O blocks to the pile.

I do love how these are turning out and I wonder what color we get to play with for the month of November.... brown, pastels, white?

Head on over to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday morning and see what other black and grey scraps have been worked into this month.

Have you seen that Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville.com has posted the colors for the fall mystery? Is anyone else joining in this year? I am! It will be my second mystery with her - which means that I really do need to pin, quilt and bind my Easy Street quilt in the next few weeks. The 97x97 dimensions to quilt on my little Viking machine are slowing me down from starting it, but since my deal with myself is it must be finished before I start the next mystery means I really do need to 'just do it' already!

I do know it will not get started this weekend. The kids are outside playing (I do love the cooler temps - 70's - so they are willing to go out and play!) before we head back to school this evening for the PTO trick or treating at school. Tomorrow I get to work and the kids will be at Grandma's for the day. It is the Cooter festival in her town and she will be bringing the kids there for a bit. Sunday.... if everyone is better and no relapses with colds/fever/ stomach bugs..... I'll take the kids to SeaWorld on Sunday for a few hours for the Halloween Spooktacular. I hope to get in to the Penguin exhibit. It was a 2 hour wait in 96 degree heat the last time we went - no way would we wait that long for it with 4 kids under the age of 7.

Next week will be busy as well - Monday night is a Math night for K+1st grades at the local Public Supermarket, Tuesday is the last Soccer game of the season, Wednesday we need to carve pumpkins and roast pumpkin seeds and Thursday is handing out candy for Trick or Treaters. Wow, that is a busy week. I think tonight after everyone is home and the kids are in bed, I'm going to curl up with a movie and finally finish the binding on the purple pineapple quilt.

A completed top!

It seems I will do anything to avoid something I don't like to do. That would be pinning a huge quilt for quilting. Easy Street from Bonnie Hunters mystery last fall really needs to get completed before I start the next one Celtic Solstice..... but instead I cut and added the borders onto this bright little quilt. I found a yard of a cute dragonfly print in the closet that just works great with this bright and cheerful quilt.

It has been kid approved.

A new project.....

When I was working on the borders for the black checkerboard quilt I had cut out lots of 2.5x5.5 inch rectangles of bright colors. Since they did not work as a border for that quilt, I was left with lots of scraps of bright colors. I decided it was time to make a coin quilt with them and got them all sewed up this week. I didn't have enough of any of my black prints to put in between them, so I went with a creamy white from the closet. This is currently 45x49 for a little quilt. I think it will need a simple 5 inch border to make it a wee bit bigger (55x59). I have some yards of kids prints that should work with it.

It has finally cooled off a bit (70 degrees) and the kids actually went outside to play after dinner for an hour without any whining or complaining. They entertained themselves on their play set and I got a little time to finish sewing these strips together. I really could get used to this! Now they are eating some pumpkin moose (I had the cream as antlers!) and then we'll finish their last hippy science experiment and call it pajama time.